I work in publishing and I like to read things. Herewith: free association on books, nice things I ate, publishing, editing, and other nice things I ate.

Monday, November 16, 2009

I'm reposting here what I was just forced to post in my own comments.

Just in case I haven't been clear about my politics, I'm a feminist who is also pro-men and pro-men's studies. I aim to be neither hurtful nor deliberately inflammatory, and I prefer that people not be hurtful or deliberately inflammatory to me or others on my blog.

With that in mind, I'm turning off anonymous comments until [the post in question] falls into the backlist, because my feelings and temper have felt a little... attacked by certain commenters here. I can't believe you don't know who you are; if you read my blog, you already know what I stand for.

If you want to come forward bravely under your own name and stand behind those kinds of comments, please be my guest.

You're not the only one, Moonie. Both Kristen Nelson and Nathan Bransford have done the same thing recently. It's a shame that anon commenters feel compelled to hijack blogs for their personal agendas.

The weird thing about the comments were that they were really run-of-the-mill, no imagination, women do housework (and choose it), men don't participate in family life type comments. I feel a bit sorry for him. For borrowing age-old arguments, and not really understanding them anyway. I didn't feel angry--I just feel that he missed the boat.

Well, glad I took the time to read the little comment war between anonymous and Maggie Stiefvater (who is a really awesome writer by the way even if what she writes is for "kids" and has romance an not-real stuff in them) it was endlessly entertaining. My guess is anonymous may not have posted his name because he is one of the judges who picks the books for the PW list. Well, the list would make sense if it was people like that who were on the panel, wouldn't it?

J K Rowling's name appears as only initials on the Harry Potter books because her publisher (? maybe it was agent) was concerned that MG boys would be unwilling to buy/read a book by a woman.

In the 1990s.

It isn't rampant or deliberate, but it still happens. I have had the actual, real life experience of having someone tell me, point blank, I was well qualified, better than the other applicants, great language skills, and the unique mix of biology and cultural experience that the job required but they were uncomfortable placing a woman in the position due to Latin American machismo. (Double points for that one. Stereotyping women and Latinos.)

So Moonie, from a pretty conservative blog follower who does not consider herself a "feminist" so much as a "humanist", or maybe even "individualist", this is not just in your head.

When I first started looking into publishing my work, sci-fi, I was told in many blog discussions with experts that I should use my initials. They went on to explain that my very female name wouldn't be taken seriously in the sci-fi genre.

As a successful corporate woman, I felt slapped in the face. In retrospect I know that I was naive to be surprised and shocked. I guess I just expected it in my career field, but not in the writing world. (What was I thinking?)

You know, it really saddens me that as feminists, we often feel obligated to add the addendum "I am a feminist who is also pro-men," as if we have to immediately nix the assumption that being feminist somehow automatically makes us anti-men. I know I'm guilty of it, as well, and I think it sucks. It sucks that the prevalent stereotype of feminism continues to be the snarling, man-hating bitch. Really, those women who claim to be feminists while being vehemently anti-male are not feminists at all - they're misandrists, and no better than misogynists.

It's just crappy that we still feel the need to couch any sort of criticism of male preference in the language of "Don't get me wrong, I *love* men, men are great, but..." I absolutely agree that the pendulum shouldn't swing too far in the other direction, but I do get so tired of having to preemptively phrase my feminist arguments to make sure the message of "I AM NOT ANTI-MALE, I AM PRO-EQUALITY, THAT IS ALL" is obvious in my words. It's silly, really... why would I be anti-men? Men are a part of my existence. Just because I think I deserve to be valued as much as they do doesn't mean I'm trying to tear them down.

Yikes, sorry for the mini-rant! I'm sorry someone felt the need to post such goofiness behind the anonymity of the internet.

Wow...I'm still kinda stunned from readin' anon's drivel. A hearty round of applause to everyone's even tempered yet fierce and quite on point handling of that nonsense, my cringe was replaced by a smile when I read the follow up comments. It's such a old, dull strategy 2 pretend 2 give a history lesson and omit all the relevant, incriminating factors, i.e. patriarchy and oppression...smh. Cheers, everyone!

Moonrat, I'm very sorry that you've had to be subjected to rudeness by people are unable to hold their own opinions without demeaning others opinions - to doso without even having the courage to sign their own names! I think of Voltaire: “I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”

You have every right (especially on your own blog!) to express your views with passion. If someone disagrees with you (as I did on the gender based list), it should be done with respect and kindness. I continually look forward to you stirring my thoughts and my ideas, even if I don't always agree with them!

Moonie -i'm really sorry you had to have that explode on your blog (reminds me of what happened with Cindy Pon post too). It seems alot of people lately have had to turn off the anon function due to these sort of flaming. Fair deuce to Maggie and angelle for their comments

Anon's comments were silly and deliberately provocative, and yes, he should have had the balls to put his name to them, but let's move on. He was probably a drive-by commenter who has gone elsewhere to infuriate another blogger.

Female writers are best served by exactly what you were doing when attacked, Moonrat - telling the world about the good writing that's out there. I love hearing about that great stuff that you just don't see on the big displays at B&N. Book/publishing bloggers are wonderful sources for extending my reading scope.

All this did give me pause for thought, though. I started looking at my own bookshelves to see whether I had a gender bias. Up till now I don't think I'd ever given a writer's gender a thought! they are either writing something I want to read, or not. I think I will add "male/female" tags to my Library Thing lists to see where I'm at, and will report back to you.